how can i find out what harddrive i need? My computer has a pentium 4, and the old harddrive no longer works.

Question

It is around 4 years old, pentium 4 2.4 ghz. I only need to upgrade the harddrive. Any tips would be appreciated.

Answer 1

Just about any standard ATA hard drive should work. If you could remove the hard drive and post the model, we could be more certain. You probably should stick with a drive 120 GB or smaller - some older systems (USUALLY older than yours) can have problems accessing the full capacity of a drive larger than 120 GB (128 GB technically). You can order one online from http://www.newegg.com for under $60.

If you do get a larger drive and it's not fully seen, there are typically 3 possible causes and ways around it:
1. Upgrade your BIOS (sometimes, a BIOS upgrade may not exist though)
2. Make sure Windows XP has Service Pack 1 or later.
3. Use software that comes with the drive (this should only be used as a last resort).

As for brand, any brand should do - just make sure you get a 3 year warranty - or 5 would be better (Seagate drives usually come with 5; most others 3, but some Maxtor drives come with 1 year warranties)

There are two commonly used drive types - SATA and ATA (sometimes referred to as EIDE, IDE, or PATA). If you look at the cables used to connect to the hard drives, an ATA drive has one that has 4 connectors and is typically white/fuzzy clear (this is the power cable) and the other will be about two inches long at the point of connection (this is the data cable).

If you had a SATA drive, the connections would be about an inch or less.

One thing - you might be able to find deals on 5400 RPM hard drives - I'd avoid these - they are slower than 7200 RPM drives and probably won't be much cheaper

Answer 2

You pronounced i think of they didnt have USB's lower back then you definately on no account pronounced you have been specific if it had any verify i think of it does have atleast 2x1.0 ports. if you bought that coputer 8 years in the past it is going to have been used on condition that 8 years in the past Pentium 2's have been dying out and Pentium 3's have been taking its place Pentium a million's domminated 1996 and nil.5 of 1997 so your computer ought to have been from 1996-June 1997 no longer 1999. If IT DOES have USB's you need to have domicile windows ninety 8 to discover mass storage in case you have that turn it on plug usb in IF its a pentium a million the HDD is ro'und 1gb-8gb inventory except upgarded if its around 8gb with a million.0usb ports it is going to take a reliable 2 hours to pass to the USB HDD. TO reformat oftentimes you want a domicile windows disc positioned it in makle the c boot the disc b4 it boots the OS it quite is often set via using the Bios the OS disc starts then you definately pass interior the path of the Blahbalh stuff then format.your computer will restart after some hours and then if yuou want the OS lower back on positioned the disc in blahblah lower back then make a/or partion/s then deploy OS (Please do no longer use something larger then ninety 8 on a pentium a million Xp will make it take a million hour to start! The instilation takes some hours and in case you want to Brute format it eneter Command prompt mode (DOS mode) and type interior the formating code whihc could be chanced on on the internet ive on no account performed it i think of someoen published it yet i think of it must be the letter of your force format C: or something.

Answer 3

Greetings!

Any stock hard drive will work. Speed is what makes one work better than another. Also, size matters. Using an eighty gig for example will take longer to find the files on the drive because it would have to look at the whole drive.
Personally I use an ata 7200 40 gig hard drive.

Good Luck
PS Change it out yourself it is really easy.

Answer 4

First thing to do is find manufacturer of your HD. Goto there website and download the HD diagnostics to a floppy. Change boot settings to floppy first run HD diagnostics and make sure it is HD failure.
If your HD is bad then you can tell if your drive is IDE or SATA by the connector. SATA is a small black conector about a 1/2 inch long. IDE is about 1 1/2 inches and has about 30 pins.
I recommend WD caviar @ 7200 RPM.

Answer 5

It will all depends on what you are using the computer for. If you download music and videos then I suggest 200-500Gb hard drive the more the merrier. Hard drives are so cheap these days, you probably do not need to spend more than $100-$150. If you have only text documents and spreadsheets then I suggest 80Gb drive.

Answer 6

Your motherboard probably uses an IDE connection. Look for a hard drive that connects by IDE interface (this is 99% of hard drives), and you should be fine.

Answer 7

Just about any eide hard drive should work but you will need to install an o/s on it for your computer to actually work.

Answer 8

Looking at your old one and Looking in properties

Answer 9

do you support serial ir paralell ATA... know that first...
after that, pick one of that type...

I would suggest 7200rpm and 80-120Gb